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Mentimeter and Padlet are two new platforms for the University which encourage engagement and support active learning in live teaching sessions and asynchronous activities. Mentimeter – An audience response system Mentimeter is an audience response system which allows you to pose questions during a live session and then display the answers back to your audience… Read more » about Tools for engagement: Mentimeter and Padlet now available
As we prepare for the new Academic Year, here is some guidance on the tools that you can use for live delivery of teaching. Zoom for online lectures and seminars As a result of staff feedback collated over the last few months, Zoom is now the recommended platform for delivery of live lecture and seminar… Read more » about Guidance for live ‘synchronous’ delivery of teaching in 2020/21
As a part of some of the improved features that have been applied to taught units in Brightspace, which include the new Updates widget and Unit overview widget, we have needed to remove the quicklinks widget to keep the unit homepages from becoming too busy. The quicklinks widget provided links and guidance for adding staff… Read more » about Unit preparation and quicklinks in Brightspace
Overview Lessons is an alternative way for staff and students to experience the Content tool in Brightspace. It provides a simplified approach to organising and viewing content, including colour-coded navigation in the left-hand column where each section can be expanded independently. This helps students move between different content areas without losing their place. The Lessons… Read more » about Brightspace Lessons Tool – pilot review
As with many TEL tools, there’s often lots of different ways to achieve the same task. Part of what we do is to try and determine the best option, or best options for different types of scenarios. The following guide covers some options for sharing links to Virtual Classroom sessions so that your sessions are… Read more » about Sharing links for Virtual Classroom sessions
Are you worried that students are not engaging with your Panopto presentations? Lets face it, no matter how interesting the subject, sitting in front of a screen for long periods can be rather tedious. So how about micro lectures? why not break that 50 minute or 2 hour presentation down into bite size chunks of… Read more » about Improving student engagement with Panopto Quizzes
As exam season approaches, here is a quick guide to some of the tools available on Brightspace that can facilitate revision by keeping those communication lines open and helping to build student understanding. The following topics are covered in this week’s online LT drop-in sessions. You can view a recording of today’s session online or… Read more » about Brightspace tools for exam revision preparation
Release Conditions allow you to release content and activities in a sequential order or to create custom learning paths for your students through the materials and activities in your unit. For example, you could create a condition that requires students to view a content topic before they gained access to a quiz. A wide range… Read more » about What are Release Conditions and how can I use them?
Staff from various teams within the university have been collaborating to develop a new tab on ME@BU (available from the Brightspace Homepage) titled Online learning@BU. This new resource will support students with their remote learning activities. The tab, which was launched yesterday, is divided into key areas that specifically address this new way of working. It will give students the tools,… Read more » about Online learning@BU
As a part our ongoing evaluation of updates to Brightspace, for Semester 2, we will be piloting a new widget called ‘Activity Feed’ which replaces the current ‘Announcements’ tool on your unit Homepage. The Activity Feed allows linked content and activities to be more easily embedded in posts and brings a new approach to the… Read more » about New Brightspace Feature Pilot – Activity Feed
